Google: I Know What You’re Thinking
by John Paczkowski
Posted on March 25, 2009 at 10:32 AM PT
“Google does have to be all things to all people. Our search does not need to be all things to all people.”
Looks like Microsoft (MSFT) just lost the sole advantage its CEO Steve Ballmer claimed it had over Google in search: the ability to experiment. The search sovereign made two changes to its search results pages Tuesday that it says will produce better results for complicated searches.
The first is a simple one: extending the length of site description for longer search queries. The second, however, is a bit more complex. Google (GOOG) is adding semantic search capabilities to its engine, an enhancement it claims will allow it to better understand the concepts and relationships associated with a query. “We’re deploying a new technology that can better understand associations and concepts related to your search, and one of its first applications lets us offer you even more useful related searches,” Ori Allon, from Google’s Search Quality Team, explained in a post to the company blog. “For example, if you search for [principles of physics], our algorithms understand that ‘angular momentum,’ ’special relativity,’ ‘big bang’ and ‘quantum mechanic’ are related terms that could help you find what you need.”
Essentially, Google has tweaked its engine to detect when a particular search is related to other concepts that don’t necessarily contain the same words as a query. It’s given the engine a sort of conceptual understanding. And that may well keep users on Google longer because they’ll be able to find relevant information about their queries without having to click through to a second site. Certainly a significant improvement and one that shows that contrary to Steve Ballmer’s claims, Google continues to experiment and innovate.
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Comments
it may have more to do with increasing the value of the ranking. if people are less likely to see your site because it is too far down the page, you had better pony up some cash and buy a spot
also if even half the claims were 1/4 true then all the major engines could tell me where I left my new pants.
Posted by jack deed at March 25th, 2009 at 11:20 amAlmost nothing Ballmer says these days can be tied to reality in any way. I don’t know if he is dishonest, or delusional when he says the world needs a $100 computer, or that Microsoft will enter the consulting business in a big way.
Like Jobs, he seems to live in a “reality distortion field” but in Jobs’ case the field at least encompasses a portion of his customer base. In Ballmer’s case it’s more like an isolation chamber.
The worst thing in the world that could happen for “cloud computing” (for lack of a better term) would be for any part of it to become dependent on Microsoft.
Posted by Mac Beach at March 25th, 2009 at 1:20 pm